Nuclear Strategy

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick M. Morgan
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Nuclear Weapons ◽  
Security Policy ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
American Military ◽  
Nuclear Strategy ◽  
Military Planning ◽  
The Stability ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Cold War

Nuclear strategy involves the production of nuclear weapons for political ends as well as the goals, means, and ways in which they are, or are planned to be, used. The roots of nuclear strategy can be traced to World War II, when nuclear scientists, as well as American and British high-level officials, began thinking about how nuclear weapons could be harnessed. Several ideas then emerged that became central to nuclear strategy, but largely ignored in early postwar American military planning. Aside from war-fighting, the United States’s grand strategy and national security policy soon focused on containment as the way to deal with communism around the world. Containment was politically and intellectually well-suited for emphasizing nuclear deterrence as a means of preventing the Cold War from escalating into war. The theory and resulting strategy was dominated by two problems: the stability problem and the credibility problem. As for actually fighting a nuclear war, strategies include demonstration explosions to curb enemy military actions, preventive and preemptive attacks, and retaliation after being attacked. The design and implementation of nuclear postures and strategies have been beset by numerous deficiencies, such as accidents with nuclear weapons and delivery systems. Fortunately, nuclear strategy did not give rise to what many feared—a self-sustaining security dilemma that made insecurity overwhelming and impossible to dispel.

scholarly journals Current foreign and security policy issues regarding stationing nuclear tactical weapons in Italy

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 2-10
Author(s):  
Lili Takács
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Nuclear Weapons ◽  
Security Policy ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
Nuclear Disarmament ◽  
International Image ◽  
Foreign And Security Policy ◽  
International Ranking ◽  
The Cold War

Italy has been storing U.S. nuclear tactical weapons since the fifties. During the Cold War Rome considered hosting nuclear weapons a tool to strengthen the international ranking of the country, hoping that it provides opportunity to restore trust in Italy’s international image, which had been shaken by World War II. As a consequence of the effect of bipolar logic on Italian domestic politics, hosting nuclear weapons guaranteed that the Italian Communist Party remained in opposition. Although the original reasons of hosting U.S. nuclear weapons have disappeared at the end of the Cold War, Italy is not actively promoting nuclear disarmament.

The Four Paradoxes of Nuclear Strategy

1964 ◽  
Vol 58 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-35 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hans J. Morgenthau
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Nuclear Weapons ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
Nuclear Strategy ◽  
Nuclear Age ◽  
Modern Age ◽  
Modes Of Thought ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Middle Ages

The nuclear age has ushered in a novel period of history, as distinct from the age that preceded it as the modern age has been from the Middle Ages or the Middle Ages have been from antiquity. Yet while our conditions of life have drastically changed under the impact of the nuclear age, we still live in our thoughts and act through our institutions in an age that has passed. There exists, then, a gap between what we think about our social, political, and philosophic problems and the objective conditions which the nuclear age has created.This contradiction between our modes of thought and action, belonging to an age that has passed, and the objective conditions of our existence has engendered four paradoxes in our nuclear strategy: the commitment to the use of force, nuclear or otherwise, paralyzed by the fear of having to use it; the search for a nuclear strategy which would avoid the predictable consequences of nuclear war; the pursuit of a nuclear armaments race joined with attempts to stop it; the pursuit of an alliance policy which the availability of nuclear weapons has rendered obsolete. All these paradoxes result from the contrast between traditional attitudes and the possibility of nuclear war and from the fruitless attempts to reconcile the two.

Continuity and Change in British Thinking about Nuclear Weapons

1994 ◽  
Vol 42 (2) ◽  
pp. 228-242 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stuart Croft
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Nuclear Weapons ◽  
Security Policy ◽  
Policy Debate ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
Continuity And Change ◽  
Mind Set ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Constant Argument

For almost fifty years there has been constant argument between those who have supported the development and possession of nuclear weapons by Britain and those opposed to those policies. This article argues that there has been a continuity in the arguments made by policy-makers and their critics, both operating within an unchanging series of linked assumptions forming a paradigm or mind-set. This article sets out the character of the assumptions of the orthodox and alternative thinkers, as they are termed in the article, examining their coherence and differences, particularly during the cold war. It concludes by attempting to draw out some implications for the British security policy debate in the post-cold war period.

scholarly journals The ANZUS Treaty during the Cold War: A Reinterpretation of U.S. Diplomacy in the Southwest Pacific

2015 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 109-157 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas K. Robb ◽  
David James Gill
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
Regional Cooperation ◽  
Coercive Diplomacy ◽  
Monetary System ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Self Interest ◽  
The Stability ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The U.S

This article explains the origins of the Australia–New Zealand–United States (ANZUS) Treaty by highlighting U.S. ambitions in the Pacific region after World War II. Three clarifications to the historiography merit attention. First, an alliance with Australia and New Zealand reflected the pursuit of U.S. interests rather than the skill of antipodean diplomacy. Despite initial reservations in Washington, geostrategic anxiety and economic ambition ultimately spurred cooperation. The U.S. government's eventual recourse to coercive diplomacy against the other ANZUS members, and the exclusion of Britain from the alliance, substantiate claims of self-interest. Second, the historiography neglects the economic rationale underlying the U.S. commitment to Pacific security. Regional cooperation ensured the revival of Japan, the avoidance of discriminatory trade policies, and the stability of the Bretton Woods monetary system. Third, scholars have unduly played down and misunderstood the concept of race. U.S. foreign policy elites invoked ideas about a “White Man's Club” in Asia to obscure the pursuit of U.S. interests in the region and to ensure British exclusion from the treaty.

India and Pakistan's Unstable Peace: Why Nuclear South Asia Is Not Like Cold War Europe

2005 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 127-152 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Paul Kapur
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
South Asia ◽  
Significant Risk ◽  
Indian Territory ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
Nuclear Level ◽  
International Attention ◽  
Low Probability ◽  
The Stability ◽  
The Cold War

Scholars attribute conventional violence in a nuclear South Asia to a phenomenon known as the “stability/instability paradox.” According to this paradox, the risk of nuclear war makes it unlikely that conventional confict will escalate to the nuclear level, thereby making conventional confict more likely. Although this phenomenon encouraged U.S.-Soviet violence during the Cold War, it does not explain the dynamics of the ongoing confict between India and Pakistan. Recent violence has seen Pakistan or its proxies launching limited attacks on Indian territory, and India refusing to retaliate in kind. The stability/instability paradox would not predict such behavior. A low probability of conventional war escalating to the nuclear level would reduce the ability of Pakistan's nuclear weapons to deter an Indian conventional attack. Because Pakistan is conventionally weaker than India, this would discourage Pakistani aggression and encourage robust Indian conventional retaliation against Pakistani provocations. Pakistani boldness and Indian restraint have actually resulted from instability in the strategic environment. A full-scale Indo-Pakistani conventional confict would create a significant risk of nuclear escalation. This danger enables Pakistan to launch limited attacks on India while deterring allout Indian conventional retaliation and attracting international attention to the two countries' dispute over Kashmir. Unlike in Cold War Europe, in contemporary South Asia nuclear danger facilitates, rather than impedes, conventional confict.

Strategic Modernization Theory Bogs Down in the Vietnam Quagmire

2019 ◽  
pp. 176-204
Author(s):  
Michael C. Desch
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
Universal Model ◽  
Modernization Theory ◽  
Nuclear Strategy ◽  
The Third ◽  
Mental Map ◽  
Intellectual Context ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Third World ◽  
The Cold War

This chapter looks at the rise and fall of strategic modernization theory. One of the key figures in bridging the worlds of nuclear strategy and political and economic development, not to mention academia and policy, was the economist Walt W. Rostow. Unique among civilian development strategists, Rostow was not only a scholar of these issues; he also held a series of high-level U.S. government positions, which made him a direct formulator and implementer of policy. The chapter then outlines the intellectual context in which he formulated his universal model of strategic modernization and development. It also studies his arguments and shows how and why they provided U.S. policymakers with the mental map to interpret the Cold War in the Third World in a particularly threatening way and also to recommend strategies to respond to the challenge of underdevelopment there.

Dreams of Freedom, Temptations of Power

2019 ◽  
pp. 243-280
Author(s):  
Melvyn P. Leffler
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Cold War ◽  
National Security ◽  
Security Policy ◽  
September 11 ◽  
World War ◽  
Memory Culture ◽  
The World ◽  
September 11 Attacks ◽  
The Cold War

This chapter considers the end of the Cold War as well as its implications for the September 11 attacks in 2001, roughly a decade after the Cold War ended. While studying the Cold War, the chapter illustrates how memory and values as well as fear and power shaped the behavior of human agents. Throughout that struggle, the divergent lessons of World War II pulsated through policymaking circles in Moscow and Washington. Now, in the aftermath of 9/11, governments around the world drew upon the lessons they had learned from their divergent national experiences as those experiences had become embedded in their respective national memories. For policymakers in Washington, memories of the Cold War and dreams of human freedom tempted the use of excessive power with tragic consequences. Memory, culture, and values played a key role in shaping the evolution of U.S. national security policy.

5. Strategic Culture

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey S. Lantis ◽  
Darryl Howlett
Keyword(s):  
Security Policy ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Weapons Of Mass Destruction ◽  
Strategic Culture ◽  
Nuclear Strategy ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
State Behaviour ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Theoretical Issues

This chapter examines the scholarly and policymaking relevance of strategic culture in the contemporary world. Strategic culture may challenge and at the same time enrich prevailing neo-realist assumptions regarding strategy and security. It bridges material and ideational explanations of state behaviour, adding valuable perspectives to understand different countries' contemporary security policy choices. The chapter first considers approaches that address the relationship between culture and nuclear strategy during the cold war before discussing theoretical issues related to strategic culture, including the contribution of constructivism to security studies; the question of ‘ownership’ of strategic culture; and whether non-state, state, and multi-state actors can possess distinctive strategic cultures. It also reviews recent work that explores the link between strategic culture and the acquisition of and threats to use weapons of mass destruction.

scholarly journals Exploring Greenland: Science and Technology in Cold War Settings

2011 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
pp. 11-42 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthias Heymann ◽  
Henrik Knudsen ◽  
Maiken L. Lolck ◽  
Henry Nielsen ◽  
Kristian H. Nielsen ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
The Arctic ◽  
Geophysical Research ◽  
American Military ◽  
Research Activities ◽  
The Usa ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Cold War

This paper explores a vacant spot in the Cold War history of science: the development of research activities in the physical environmental sciences and in nuclear science and technology in Greenland. In the post-war period, scientific exploration of the polar areas became a strategically important element in American and Soviet defence policy. Particularly geophysical fields like meteorology, geology, seismology, oceanography, and others profited greatly from military interest. While Denmark maintained formal sovereignty over Greenland, research activities were strongly dominated by U.S. military interests. This paper sets out to summarize the limited current state of knowledge about activities in the environmental physical sciences in Greenland and their entanglement with military, geopolitical, and colonial interests of both the USA and Denmark. We describe geophysical research in the Cold War in Greenland as a multidimensional colonial endeavour. In a period of decolonization after World War II, Greenland, being a Danish colony, became additionally colonized by the American military. Concurrently, in a period of emerging scientific internationalism, the U.S. military “colonized” geophysical research in the Arctic, which increasingly became subject to military directions, culture, and rules.

Monsters in the Machine

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steffen Hantke
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
Social History ◽  
Industrial Complex ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
Science Fiction Films ◽  
The 1950S ◽  
To Come ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Military

During the 1950s and early 1960s, the American film industry produced a distinct cycle of films situated on the boundary between horror and science fiction. Using the familiar imagery of science fiction, the vast majority of these films subscribed to the effects and aesthetics of horror film, anticipating the dystopian turn of many science fiction films to come. These films often evinced paranoia, unease, fear, shock, and disgust. Not only did these movies address technophobia and its psychological, social, and cultural corollaries, they also returned persistently to the military as a source of character, setting, and conflict. Commensurate with a state of perpetual mobilization, the US military comes across as an inescapable presence in American life. Regardless of their genre, this book argues that these films have long been understood as allegories of the Cold War. They register anxieties about two major issues of the time: atomic technologies, especially the testing and use of nuclear weapons, as well as communist aggression and/or subversion. Setting out to question, expand, and correct this critical argument, the book follows shifts and adjustments prompted by recent scholarly work into the technological, political, and social history of America in the 1950s. Based on this revised historical understanding, science fiction films appear in a new light as they reflect on the troubled memories of World War II, the emergence of the military-industrial complex, the postwar rewriting of the American landscape, and the relative insignificance of catastrophic nuclear war compared to America's involvement in postcolonial conflicts around the globe.

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